But business is slow on this sunny Wednesday morning in Lac-Mégantic’s new retail district — a row of 18 pre-fab shops that could have been lifted straight out of an outlet mall in Brossard or St-Sauveur.

Two-thirds of the storefronts are still empty and one of the tenants, an SAQ liquor store, is already planning to move out to a new commercial strip being built in the nearby Fatima neighbourhood.

A year after the oil-train derailment that killed 47 people and destroyed half of the downtown core, Lac-Mégantic is reinventing itself.

Under an urban plan adopted in September, the former downtown — until the tragedy an old-fashioned main street lined by an assortment of local businesses — has been relocated. Small businesses are moving into the small mall where Lacombe’s boutique is located, while larger ones like a Métro supermarket are moving to the new business district in Fatima, a working-class community across the Chaudière River. A $4.5-million bridge to the new commercial zone is under construction.

And in the devastated former town centre, where bulldozers are digging up contaminated soil behind a wire fence, a new waterfront area with a hotel, boutiques and an outdoor concert space is slated to rise from the ashes starting in 2015.

Clashing visions of how to rebuild Lac-Mégantic’s shattered downtown have deeply divided the lakeside community of 6,000, 250 kilometres east of Montreal.

For some local residents, the reconstruction plan is a blueprint for a greener, more prosperous future. With a boardwalk, open-air market and memorial to those who died, the redesigned town centre will boost tourism and enhance the lakeside town’s attractiveness, its backers say.

But others say the people whose interests should have come first — the residents and merchants who lost their homes and livelihoods in the disaster — have been ill-served by in the rebuilding plan. Few of the merchants relocated in the wake of the tragedy are expected to move back to the rebuilt town centre because it would be too expensive to uproot their businesses a second time.

Meanwhile, property owners are being pushed out of the downtown core. The town has approached all owners with purchase offers and intends to acquire the entire former downtown, valued at an estimated $20 million. However, land sales have been on hold since the provincial election in April, when the new Liberal government froze funding.

Gift-shop owner Lacombe, who lives just outside the evacuated zone, said many of her neighbours would like to move back when the downtown reopens but are being pressured to sell.

“They should give people the choice,” she said.

“They seem to be deciding for us, as if whatever we had before doesn’t count,” Lacombe added.

“It’s like saying, ‘You don’t count for anything, get out of the way.’ ”

* * *

Urban planner Marc Perreault, who designed the reconstruction plan, said that by acquiring the land, the town will be able to pick and choose businesses that suit its vision for the new town centre.

“They will be able to provide leadership the way they do in resorts and places like that, where you are able to establish the right mix,” said Perreault, a vice-president of the IBI/DAA urban planning firm who worked on the master plans for the McGill University Hospital Centre, Mont-Tremblant resort and Faubourg Boisbriand.

“If we promote tourism, as the town intends, there are other types of stores — other restaurants, other café-terrasses, souvenir shops, specialized food stores like pastry shops and small cafés — that could come in,” he said.

Perreault, who was hired by the town last July to devise the new urban plan, said town officials had to act quickly to keep businesses that had been evacuated from the downtown core in Lac-Mégantic.

The town initially considered housing them temporarily in trailers but Perreault nixed that proposal, judging that a permanent solution was preferable for all concerned. He identified two sites near the former downtown that could accommodate a shopping district: the grounds of the town’s $30-million sports centre, which opened in 2011, and Fatima, a low-income district the town had already targeted for redevelopment.

Originally scheduled to open in time for Christmas shopping, the small mall near the sports centre was completed in April. However, many businesses still haven’t moved in because they are waiting for government assistance with relocation costs.

While the Quebec public security department has been criticized for being too slow to process claims arising from the tragedy, the town has been accused of undue haste in adopting an urban plan that promises to sweep away all traces of Lac-Mégantic’s once-picturesque downtown, whose neat brick and frame buildings dated back to the late 19th century.

Former Premier Pauline Marois unveiled the plan on Aug. 25 when she visited the stricken town to promise $16-million in reconstruction funding. In February, former municipal affairs minister Sylvain Gaudreault promised an additional $20 million to buy out downtown property-owners.

Jonathan Santerre, an interior designer and founder of the Carré bleu Lac Mégantic citizens’ group, noted that the town held no public consultations before deciding to resettle merchants permanently outside the downtown core.

“The idea behind it, from what we can see, is that the town wants to buy all the buildings, tear everything down and start over fresh. That’s what people are afraid of,” Santerre said.

On March 26, the town began a series of public consultations on the plan for the town centre. But many local residents say the major decisions have already been made.

“They showed us the plan two weeks after the tragedy. And they’ve hardly changed anything,” Lacombe said.

On May 25, Action Mégantic, a group of 30 local business people, unveiled a proposal to raze the former downtown and turn the site of the tragedy into a tourist attraction with a 150-room hotel and convention centre.

Local residents panned the idea of exploiting the tragedy’s tourism potential. However, the current urban plan does include a hotel.

Planner Perreault said “very few” of the surviving buildings in the downtown core are worth saving.

Of the 39 buildings still standing, 11 are contaminated. Thirty buildings were destroyed in the disaster.

What gave the former downtown its charm, Perreault said, was “not so much the architecture” as the harmonious mix of two- and three-storey buildings along the main street.

But Santerre said the former business district’s frontier-style flavour will be lost if the remaining buildings are torn down.

“It’s not Brossard here. It’s Lac-Mégantic. We had a Western look,” he said.

Santerre said he surveyed local residents on what should be done with the city core.

“There was a majority consensus that people would like to restore the downtown,” he said.

The reconstruction plan has also caused heartache in the Fatima neighbourhood, where several homeowners have been forced out to make way for the new commercial strip. Nine buildings were torn down for the 34,000-square-foot Métro supermarket, scheduled to open in October.

“It was like a second tragedy for those people,” Santerre said.

* * *

In his gleaming new shoe store in the small mall, across the street from Lacombe’s gift shop, Denis Bolduc waits and worries.

After a flurry of customers when he opened in April, business has fallen off. And the departure of the SAQ next October, which will move into the new Métro supermarket, is not a good sign, Bolduc said.

In the old downtown, where everything was close at hand, from the lovingly restored former Lambrequin décor boutique to the popular Dollarama store, there was always a certain amount of walk-in business.

“You had the Métro store. There was our store, Bolduc Shoes. The National Bank was there. There was a lawyers’ office.

“When you talk about the classic downtown, with stores, residents and offices, that’s what we had,” Bolduc said.

The question is whether customers will remain faithful now that retailers are spread over a wider area.

“I’ll tell you a secret,” Bolduc said.

“Even in the old downtown, it already wasn’t easy for small businesses in Lac-Mégantic.”

In a town where people tend to use their cars for even the shortest trips, will the independent businesses that used to rub elbows on Lac-Mégantic’s venerable shopping strip still thrive in the new retail environment?

Comments

We encourage all readers to share their views on our articles and blog posts. We are committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion, so we ask you to avoid personal attacks, and please keep your comments relevant and respectful. If you encounter a comment that is abusive, click the "X" in the upper right corner of the comment box to report spam or abuse. We are using Facebook commenting. Visit our FAQ page for more information.

Almost Done!

Postmedia wants to improve your reading experience as well as share the best deals and promotions from our advertisers with you. The information below will be used to optimize the content and make ads across the network more relevant to you. You can always change the information you share with us by editing your profile.

By clicking "Create Account", I hearby grant permission to Postmedia to use my account information to create my account.

I also accept and agree to be bound by Postmedia's Terms and Conditions with respect to my use of the Site and I have read and understand Postmedia's Privacy Statement. I consent to the collection, use, maintenance, and disclosure of my information in accordance with the Postmedia's Privacy Policy.

Postmedia wants to improve your reading experience as well as share the best deals and promotions from our advertisers with you. The information below will be used to optimize the content and make ads across the network more relevant to you. You can always change the information you share with us by editing your profile.

By clicking "Create Account", I hearby grant permission to Postmedia to use my account information to create my account.

I also accept and agree to be bound by Postmedia's Terms and Conditions with respect to my use of the Site and I have read and understand Postmedia's Privacy Statement. I consent to the collection, use, maintenance, and disclosure of my information in accordance with the Postmedia's Privacy Policy.